


Only Skin Deep

by 27dragons, tisfan



Series: MCU Kink Bingo [53]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Blood, Cutting, Knife Play, M/M, Scarification, Subspace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-06
Updated: 2018-11-06
Packaged: 2019-08-19 19:07:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16540403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/27dragons/pseuds/27dragons, https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan
Summary: Bucky needs an anchor, something to come home to. A reason to remember who he is.





	Only Skin Deep

**Author's Note:**

> for MCU Kink Bingo Fill I5 - knife play
> 
> Graphic descriptions of blood and cutting. no actual smut, but Bucky does skim on subspace.

Bucky was sitting, elbows on his knees, face in his hands. He wasn’t sobbing; sometimes the sobbing was easier to take. Being able to cry reminded him that he was human, that he was something other than a programmed machine, designed to help Hydra bring around the fall of humanity.

Of course, there wasn’t usually a trail of bodies, either.

They were all Hydra bodies, mostly.

“How bad is it?” Bucky asked, numb. “What did I do this time?”

Sometimes he could remember, pick bits and pieces of memory out of the mush that made up his brain. Sometimes he could even figure the exact moment his recovery broke down and he reverted back to the Winter Soldier.

The Winter Soldier, who’d broken through seventy years of torture, of brainwashing, of being a programmed killer.

Who apparently had a revenge streak a mile wide and the need to fill that mile with blood.

“Did I hurt anyone?”

Tony looked around, double-checking the carnage, and then crouched in front of Bucky where he’d be blocking the view of the worst of it, if Bucky ever decided to look up. “Just Hydra,” he said, keeping his tone carefully neutral. Sometimes that was a comfort. Sometimes, not.

“I don’t know how to remember who I am,” Bucky said. “They don’t… they don’t even have t’ say the goddamn words anymore. It just… it just _happens_.” He pulled out one of his knives. Tony didn’t even know where he got them from. Old, but well balanced. Deadly antiques. Whenever Bucky snapped, he disappeared and he’d show up again days, or sometimes even weeks later, fully kitted in the Winter Soldier gear, mask and armor and knives. Always the knives. He did damage with a sniper rifle, a pistol, but the Winter Soldier liked to get up close and messy.

“I know, sweetheart,” Tony said softly. “At least you always seem to know whose team you’re on, even when it happens?” That... wasn’t much of a comfort, Tony knew. But what else was he supposed to say? He wasn’t going to lie to Bucky.

“I remembered, that one… that one time,” Bucky said. “Came back to myself, before-- before I… went crazy. Do you remember? I was… I found a stash, I always find them, I don’t know why I remember all the locations when I’m crazy. I can’t find them, otherwise. But… I was getting geared up, pulled--”

He gestured like he was tugging on a pair of those fingerless gloves he wore with the grip in the palm. Metal didn’t hold guns -- or knives -- particularly well, so the Winter Soldier wore gloves. “You--” he barked a little laugh “-- you bit me. You were playing around, said you wanted to leave a mark on me that lasted more than an hour or so. Do you remember?”

Tony smiled, a little. “Yeah, I remember.” Bucky _loved_ marking Tony up, and he liked seeing Tony’s marks on him, too, but they never lasted.

“I saw that, I saw that, and I--he… lovebite. Why would I have a lovebite? No one touched the Winter Soldier, not like that. I couldn’t understand it. Kept tracing it with my thumb, worrying at it until it healed, until the bruise that was left there was the one I was making myself _. Remembered_ , finally. And I came home. I remembered, and I came home.”

Tony nodded. “Yeah, you did.” He reached out, carefully, brushed Bucky’s hair back. Sometimes when he was like this, Bucky leaned into tender gestures. Sometimes he rejected them. Tony couldn’t stand not to try, though.

He cupped Tony’s hand, kept it there, pressed against his temple. “I… I been thinkin’, since the last time this happened. That maybe I need that. A reminder. Something that _he_ wouldn’t have. Not clothes or paint or ink, something that couldn’t wash off. Something that wouldn’t get lost.”

“Honey, if you’re asking me to bite your hand every couple of days just so you always have a mark, I’m all in, but it seems pretty inefficient.”

“The bite’ll fade, I was… I was thinkin’ a little more lasting.”

Bucky held up the knife, a strange sort of hope, a flash of need, on his face.

Tony looked at it, startled, and then looked back at that naked, desperate hope on Bucky’s face. He opened his mouth, closed it. Gingerly, he reached up and took the knife from Bucky’s hand, letting himself feel the weight of it, the balance. He couldn’t quite drag his eyes off the sheen of the edge. “What do you have in mind?”

Bucky tugged his sleeve up, showed off a patch of clean, porcelain skin on the underside of his arm. There were a few freckles there that marred the smooth surface. “Your name. Remind me where I belong. Who I am. Why I’m still fighting.”

Tony traced down the skin with a fingertip. “How long will it last?”

“Deep enough t’ scar? Two, three weeks. Maybe a month. You’re already under my skin, baby. Jus’... jus’ need some help t’ see it.”

Tony drew a shaky breath, let it out slow, but he already knew he’d do it. There was nothing he wouldn’t do to help Bucky, if it came down to it. “Okay,” he said. “Okay.” He looked back up into Bucky’s face, reading the relief there. “But not here, yeah? At home. So when you do remember, you can remember it was done with love.”

“Okay,” Bucky said. He drew in a few deep, shuddering breaths. “Let’s… let’s get outta here. Let th’ clean up crew do their thing. Least it’s only Hydra. They’re… like Doritos or something. Kill all you want, we’ll make more.” He barked another one of those dull, not quite laughs. Choked on it, and it turned into muffled sobs against Tony’s neck.

Well, that part was good. When he could cry. That was good. Tony had to remind himself.

***

Bucky examined the kit that Tony had laid out, very carefully. Sterile tools and antiseptics, a roll of mesh bandages.

_Useless_ , the Winter Soldier opined in the back of Bucky’s skull, like a seed tick that he couldn’t quite dig out.

Bucky both agreed and disagreed with the assessment. It wasn’t like Bucky could get an infection, no matter what Tony used to carve up his skin. Or, truthfully, he could, but it wouldn’t last long enough to worry about. His ramped up immune system would kill anything short of ebola. (Bucky wasn’t sure about that one. It sounded nasty and they’d never been exposed, so, that was good. He didn’t plan to try it out, either.)

But the tools and the sterile environment was helping Tony stay calm, and therefore, had use. The Winter Soldier didn’t offer an opinion on Tony Stark, beyond wondering if the man would puke, cutting into someone.

_He won’t puke_ , Bucky told himself. _Tony’s tough._ That was also true. Tony was tough, tougher than he looked, stronger than he had any right to be. Tony had never lost himself, had never had to fight, tooth and claw to come back to sanity, because Bucky was pretty sure if Tony ever had, he’d have won. It was Bucky that was weak. Bucky who kept falling back down. Bucky who kept letting go.

Warm fingers cupped his chin, lifting his face until he was looking into Tony’s gorgeous brown eyes, steady and calm. “You with me?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” Bucky said. He made a gesture over the tray, although he had no idea what he was indicating. “This ain’t too much for you, I hope.” He really did hope that even though he could see going to someone else with it, his crazy request. Steve would argue with him. Nat would do it. Sam would probably do it gleefully, although all three of them would probably want to write something else. Only Tony would do what Bucky wanted, just because Bucky wanted it.

Tony was the only one who never tried to tell him that he didn’t know his own mind.

Tony made a face. “I’ve stitched my own wounds before, I’m not squeamish. Little different doing it to someone else, I’ll admit, but I’ll be okay, as long as it’s what you want.”

“It’ll be okay, one way or th’ other,” Bucky said. Which was also true. If it didn’t _work_ , at least it would heal. Like it never happened. Which was what happened with so goddamn much of his brain. _Let it work, please, please god, let me be able to hold onto this._

He sat in the chair and propped his arm on the table, hand relaxed. There was a strange sort of zinging anticipation, waiting for it. The same sort of heat, sometimes, that he got, watching Tony from across the room. Before Tony was aware, even, that Bucky had _intentions._

Tony wet a cotton ball with alcohol and swabbed it over Bucky’s arm. “If it works,” he said, his focus on Bucky’s arm, “I’ve been reading up on ways to make scars stand out more, take longer to heal.” He picked up the sterilized knife and rested the point against Bucky’s skin. “Ready?”

Bucky loosened his jaw. “I’m ready.” The expectancy of pain was the worst part of it. Actual pain wasn’t too bad. But waiting for it to happen, that was… weirdly pleasant. Like his nerves were harp strings, quivering, just after a sound. Being marked… being claimed by Tony… that wasn’t so bad. Was damn nice, if he had to be honest. And if it hurt, getting to that point, that was just the cost. “Kinda… kinda feels like an affirmation, you think?”

Tony glanced up at him with a smile. “Yeah, it does.” He leaned in and kissed Bucky quickly. “I want you to remember, this is because I love you. Okay? Okay. Eyes on me, now, don’t look. I want you to think about me, so you’ll _remember_ me.”

It wasn’t hard to do, turning his head to gaze up at Tony. Warm, whiskey dark eyes, laugh lines that made an adorable net around them, the way he smiled and his whole face just lit up. Tony Stark, one of the most beautiful people on the planet. Who wanted, for some unfathomable reason, to be _with Bucky_.

“Never wanna forget you, baby,” Bucky swore. Like Tony didn’t know that.

“I know.” Tony smiled at him again, then looked down, and-- the first cut barely even hurt. A whisper-soft sound as the blade parted his flesh, and then a swell of heat.

Bucky kept his knives sharp, sharp enough to split hair. A sharp knife hurt less, but cut deeper. Tony blotted the blood with a damp bandage, made a second cut. The center, where the vertical met the horizontal lines, that stung, the skin cut there more ragged than the rest, and when Tony blotted it, it sizzled, the edges peeling back.

Bucky hissed, letting himself feel it. He didn’t have to make noise, he didn’t have to acknowledge it. He was well trained to ignore pain, but he wanted to feel it. He wanted to remember it.

This wasn’t something the Winter Soldier would ever to do himself. It wasn’t something the Winter Soldier would ever allow anyone else to do. This… this was something personal, intimate, between Bucky and Tony. He wanted to remember it. Burn it into his memory like a brand.

“Go on,” he said.

Tony nodded, blotted up more blood, started again. The O was more difficult than two straight lines, made in a series of short cuts, with pauses to clean up. It set his nerve endings on fire, and he had to work to make himself focus on the intent expression on Tony’s face. “There,” Tony said, when it was finally done. “That’s the hardest one. You doing okay?”

Bucky glanced at it, not sure what he wanted to say. The boy that he’d been, oh, so long ago, probably would have been clenching down on a whimper. Bucky barely remembered that boy, the one who’d gone off to the Army in his jaunty cap and jacket. That one might have even let an involuntary tear slide down his cheek, and then been flushy and embarrassed about it.

“Looks good,” Bucky said. And it did, really. Simple, but elegant. Like Tony had been _practicing_. But he should have known that Tony would have steady hands. Like a surgeon. Like an engineer.

“Good,” Tony said. He leaned in, nuzzled at Bucky’s mouth and drew out a gentle kiss. “Two more letters,” he said. “Six straight lines. You’re ready.”

“Oh, hell yes,” Bucky said. He let his eyes slip shut and gave a soft sound on the exhale. His arm was complaining, the cuts throbbed, ached. They fucking hurt. The rest of his body was responding, dumping adrenaline and serotonin. He shifted his hips a little in the chair, as if to settle out, and the fabric of his trousers seemed a little snug. “Is it fuckin’ whacked of me t’ kinda find this a little bit sexy?”

“Nah,” Tony said easily, prepping another gauze swab. “A little kinky. Maybe more than a little. But I can see the appeal. You’ve got every single bit of my attention, right now. You’re giving part of yourself to me, and I’m taking it. Claiming it. Hard not to find it at least a little sexy.” Another line of fire erupted as he started the N.

The bright sparkle of pain danced along his nerves. Adrenaline rushed, urging him to some action. He'd taken worse wounds in battle, of course he had. But somehow enduring pain for its own sake, was different. Cleaner somehow, as if he could be absolved.

“Think I might get the emotion, the point, behind self flagellation.” Free himself of his sins through pain.

Tony huffed a little laugh. “You want to get into whipping, next?” He shot Bucky a sly, heated little smile before bending back to his task.

“I've been told th’ armor would make a good Dom kit,” Bucky commented. It was one of Clint's favorite lines. “Whips and chains excite me?”

If the point where two lines met was difficult, the three-way join at the center of the Y was _exquisitely_ painful, and just a little stomach-turning, the way he could feel the already-cut skin pulling apart from the pressure.

Strange, how nine little lines, really, made him dizzy, woozy like he'd been drinking heavily. More so than when he'd been fucking shot. How about that.

Floaty.

_Tony._

“You're always my anchor,” he told Tony, earnest. “Don't know if I'd have the strength to find my way back at all, if it wasn't for you.”

“I’ll always be here for you,” Tony promised. He dabbed up the last of the blood -- though the cuts still welled with it, it wasn’t dripping anymore -- then looked up to examine Bucky’s face. “Oh, wow. You look amazing.” He lifted a hand to brush his thumb over Bucky’s lips. “Feeling good, gorgeous?”

Good was a word. He wasn't entirely sure it applied. His arm burned and ached enough that he stated to consider the benefits of amputation. But it wasn't exactly wrong, either, was it?

“Yeah. Yeah, I think so.” He thought it might work, that it might actually work, and that hope, that certainty, added to the euphoria. “Yeah.” He learned up, catching Tony's lips in a soft, eager kiss.

Tony’s hand curled around his neck, steadying and supporting him as they kissed, Tony’s tongue flicking across his lip, teasing at the corners of his mouth. “Love you,” Tony murmured. “Love you so much.”


End file.
